Description

The Medium Tank T25 is a Rank IV American medium tank with a battle rating of 6.0 (AB/SB) and 5.7 (RB). It was introduced in Update 1.53 "Firestorm". The T25 is to all intents and purposes, a prototype M26 Pershing, with nearly the same design, turret, and gun. It comes directly after the M4A3 (76) W in the American medium tank line.

Usage in the battles

The T25 is a medium tank, but the mobility can give an impression that it is a quick heavy tank when driving it. Its top speed is on par with the Comet, but it accelerates slower than it. The T25 is respectably mobile and is one of the first American tanks to have neutral steering, which allows for excellent and light low-speed handling and useful in tight urban maps. The T25's saving grace is the fact that its got the 90 mm, on par to the Tiger's 88 mm gun.

When using this tank, use it as what it is - a medium tank. It has many of the very desirable qualities for a medium tank - containing elements of a tank destroyer, a medium tank, and a heavy tank into one powerful pack. Its armour is above average, being on par with a Tiger I, because of it being sloped. When angled, the tank is extremely tough, but do not expect the armour to save the T25 every time - the common IS-2 is extremely dangerous. Its hide may be thick, but once upgraded, it can keep up with things like Panthers, but don't expect to win any running races soon! Its speed is what surprises many players, as American tanks are not known for their speed. It allows flanking maneuvers and to get to places where American tankers could only dream of. This leads onto its tank destroyer blood - the part that makes the T25 very effective. It has access to the famed M82 APCBC rounds, which matches Russian tanks on post-penetration effect, owing to the massive amount of explosive filler - all 137 grams of it. And for good measure, it has the same penetration as a Tiger 1's 88mm APCBC rounds. It even has access to very powerful APCR rounds for it's BR, but the T25 will not usually need 260 mm of penetration. Its multiple types of blood makes it a jack of all trades, with its only weakness being mobility and thin side armour. The T25 gives a glimpse of America's medium tank gameplay after their Sherman series.

90mm cannon is notorious for having a longer reload time than its competitors

Armour is woefully inadequate at its rank

Slow, can't keep up with T-34 and Panthers

Stock shell is bad

History

T20 series

After the M4 Sherman was adopted as the United State military's standard tank, work began on a new tank design to be the successor of the M4 Sherman. U.S. Ordnance Department got to work in spring of 1942, which would lead up to the T20 tank designs. The T20, along with its variants like the T22 and T23, were all marginal improvements over the M4 Sherman with a more powerful 76 mm gun, a rear transmission design, and having a much lower profile. While Ordnance Department tinkered around with these designs with various components, Armored Board rejected the few designs offered to them for being maintenance extensive, as well as not seeing a need to replace their abundant and well-suited M4 Shermans on the field. While the tanks were rejected, they did provide some technical upgrades to the current Sherman designs. An example of this is the horizontal-volute suspension system (HVSS)that eventually became the suspension of the "E8" Shermans such as the M4A3E8.[1] Another example is the T23 turret, which would become the main turret on Shermans mounting the 76 mm cannon on the "E6" program.

Though Armored Board rejected the tanks for immediate combat use, the Ordnance Department continued their development. The T20s were not completely disregarded, as one of the models, the T23, was seen as promising enough that an initial order of 250 tanks was placed in May 1943. As tests continued, the order was modified. 50 of the tanks were to be adapted to use a 90 mm gun as its main armament. Forty of them were to be simple T23 upgrades with the new turret, but ten were to also have additional armour on the hull. These two 90 mm tanks asked are designated the T25 and T26 respectively.[1]

Development of the T25

The first T25 was made by converting a T23 into a T25 by adding a 90 mm gun turret onto the T23. The converted T25 first arrived at Aberdeen Proving Ground in 21 January 1944, and a second one arrived at Fort Knox on 29 April. Both models had a horizontal-volute suspension system with 23-inch tracks. The T25 was roughly 3 tons heavier than the T23. The T25 carried the 90 mm gun T7, the prototype of the 90 mm M3. Other changes in the T25 conversion from the T23 was a narrower and longer driver hatch to adapt to the gun mantlet of the new turret, as well as smaller changes in the interior for increased ammo storage. The transmission was still that of the T23 with the electric transmission with a Ford GAN engine.[1]

Another variant of the T25 was developed by Ordnance when they discovered that the electric drive on the T25 and T26 added too much weight to the overall design. Ordnance changed the transmission on the two tanks to a torqmatic transmission design, essentially an improved T20's transmission design. The tanks with the torqmatic transmission were designated with an "E1" name to T25E1 and T26E1. It was decided that the "E1" tanks were to be the standard production model with the to go along with the orders. Production and deliveries of the T25E1 and T26E1 was carried out between February to May 1944. These tanks had the new transmission designs as well as torsion bar suspensions. The T25E1 and T26E1 participated in many tests at Aberdeen Proving Grounds and Fort Knox for their suitability in combat and and design flaws that needed fixing. Testings for the E1 tanks lasted from their arrival in February to summer 1944.[1]

Rejection and fate

By summer of 1944, Operation Overlord commenced and battle reports coming in from the troops are taken in for any suggestions on future tank developments. The troops in Normandy were running into anti-tank defenses able to destroy their M4 Shermans with ease, and now they called for a tank with a more powerful armament and more armour. This new perspective caused an unfortunate setback for the T25 in comparison to its uparmoured brother T26. As such, priority on the T25 declined as priority work went into the T26 and into fixing its faults. Only 42 tanks, 2 T25 and 40 T25E1s, were produced between January to May 1944.[1]

The T25 and T25E1 tanks continued on in Armored Board and Ordnance Department as test pieces for other projects. The T25 in Armored Board stayed in testing until 28 September 1944, before their focus also switched to the T26 series. Ordnance took a T25E1 tank and converted it into a T26E3 variant to test for various modifications that would go onto the redesigning of the T26E1 into the T26E3. The T25E1 was also tested with various of guns like a 90 mm gun T14. There was also a proposal to mount a 105 mm T5E1 gun, but this never past the concept drawing stages.[1]

The T26 and T26E1 models, now the main focus of Ordnance and Armored Board, had its defects found in the field testing fixed by late 1944 under the designation T26E3. The tank, with an order of 250 already made since January 1944, went on into production in November 1944, with 40 tanks delivered by the end of the year. The T26E3, in a bid for further testing, was sent to Europe for combat evaluation on the field against German armour. The T26E3 would prove sterling service against German heavy tanks like the Panther and Tiger I. The T26E3 tank was then finally accepted and standardized on March 1945 in Army Ground Forces as the M26 Pershing.[1]